


Responsible

by Phandabbydosey



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 2009 Phan, Angst, Depression, M/M, Memories, Suicide, omg, this was my first ever fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 04:30:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9368000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phandabbydosey/pseuds/Phandabbydosey
Summary: Phil’s never been good with responsibilities, but he’s sure he can change when he vows to be there for the boy he loves.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm finally posting all of my fics over on AO3 now, which is long overdue since I read fics on this site more than tumblr.  
> But yeah, my tumblr is phandabbydosey if you'd rather see this fic over there :D

I’d never been good with responsibilities, taking care of something. Most of my possessions - the ones I haven’t lost - have some level of damage from where they’d been dropped or treated too roughly.

When I was nine years old, I’d managed to convince my mother I was responsible enough to have a pet. Of course, she didn’t trust me with a dog or a cat or anything like that right away so we went to pet shop and soon I had small, brown hamster to call my own. I’d picked out a great cage, got mum to buy all the supplies we needed and was the happiest I’d ever been.

I tried so hard to care for that hamster; I cleaned out the sawdust every few days, made sure his food and water were always filled, I even oiled his wheel so it would spin smoothly. But, as always, I messed up.

I’d just been cleaning out his cage, my little hamster happily rolling around in his ball on the kitchen floor. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but all of my efforts to be responsible seemed to have been for nothing. I was still forgetful. I still left the back door open and, before I knew it, the hamster ball was at the bottom of the pond and my first pet was no more.

Needless to say, I didn’t get another pet after that. My mum offered to get me another hamster, probably hoping that some experience would teach me to be responsible, but I always declined. I wasn’t capable of caring for something, of looking after it all by myself. It would just end in suffering for both parties involved.

So, I managed to avoid that sort of responsibility for a long time. I made sure there was always someone else to look after people at parties, I was never the designated driver, I asked around for other opinions when someone came to me for advice. Serious matters were never my responsibility and I liked that. I couldn’t screw up that way.

It couldn’t last forever though, and a spanner was thrown into my system a few years after I started up my YouTube channel. A beautiful, kind, sweet spanner named Daniel Howell.

He was only seventeen when he first started replying to my tweets and he seemed like such a wonderful boy. Soon enough, we were speaking regularly over Skype and I started feeling something more. I’d get butterflies when I saw his name pop up to tell me he was online and his laugh - even if it was distorted by crappy laptop speakers - made my heart heart flutter. We got closer and closer and finally, we met in person.

It was as amazing as I thought it would be, a weekend full of laughs and smiles which ended with soft touches and moans and whispered words of love. Neither of us had realised how hard we’d fallen for each, but neither of us cared.

I’d been living in a bubble of bliss, my rose tinted glasses showing me nothing but perfection. The bubble didn’t take long to pop though.

It was about a week after Dan had visited me and, other than slight delays in his response time to messages, everything seemed the same. I got my usual butterflies when a notification pinged to tell me Dan wanted to Skype, but the little creatures fell dead moments after I clicked accept.

Rather than the dazzling smile I was used to, I was greeted with tear stains and sad eyes. Concern filled me immediately.

“Dan!” I gasped, my shocked face reflected back to me in the bottom corner of my screen, “Wh-What’s wrong?! You…You’ve been crying!”

“It’s okay Phil, I just need to tell you something. Something important that I shouldn’t have kept from you for this long.” His voice was soft, like when he was speaking affectionately or about something he loved. But the gentle tone just radiated sadness and it broke my heart to hear his voice sound like that, “Phil…I-well-I’m depressed, Phil. I was long before I met you and I know I should’ve told you but I didn’t want you to think differently of me. I’m sorry but I’m on medicine for it and it’s been getting a bit better recently but I don’t really want to talk about it and I just-”

I cut off his upset babbling with a gentle voice, handling the situation surprising well. “Dan, I don’t think any differently of you and it touches me that you trust me enough to tell me this. I still feel exactly the same way, you’re not suddenly a different person because you’ve told me this and,” I took a deep breath, knowing what my next sentence would mean, “I’m always here if you need someone to talk to. I promise.”

“Thank you,” Dan whispered, a small smile lifting the corners of his mouth.

And that was that. Dan went on to tell me a little bit more about his depression and I listened attentively, knowing I needed to take all this information in. I had a responsibility again. I’d made Dan a promise to be there for him, meaning I had to help him and make sure he was okay. I had to take care of my boyfriend.

I didn’t realise how much Dan had been hiding from me and, gradually, I got him to open up. I let him call me in the middle of the night when he was crying and couldn’t sleep. I sent him huge paragraphs over text when he became so filled with self-hatred that he couldn’t see why I would love him. I held him close the night I stayed over his and he had a breakdown, wailing about how he wanted to die to escape what was in his head. This sort of episode didn’t occur often and it hurt to hear him speak like that, or to hear him sobbing and not be able to offer anything but words through a phone, but I didn’t mind. I’d taken on this responsibility, I was determined to take care of Dan and help him through this. I’d get it right this time.

 

~~~~~~~

 

I’d never been good with responsibilities, taking care of someone.

I thought that with age it would have just come naturally, that I would’ve moved past the time my forgetfulness landed my hamster at the bottom of our garden pond. I thought that if I cared enough about something, it wouldn’t matter that I was forgetful and irresponsible.

It didn’t.

I was still as forgetful as I had been when I was nine. I’d been to the cinema with a few friends one night and turned my phone off, to save the embarrassment of having my ringtone blare out during the film. We’d got back late, I’d forgotten to turn my phone back on and fallen asleep.

It wasn’t until morning that I realised what I’d done. I awoke and got breakfast, wondering why my phone hadn’t buzzed to tell me my ‘Good Morning x’ text from Dan had arrived. I was a little surprised to find it turned off, but just shrugged it off. No one was as used to my forgetfulness as I was.

To say I was confused by what I saw on my phone screen was an understatement, though my mind quickly worked it out and was sent into a panic. Sixteen missed calls from Dan, all between 2 and 3am. There was one from his mother too (who’s number I’d got when he came to stay over, just in case I needed to contact her).

I felt sick. I couldn’t bring myself to listen to Dan’s voicemails, knowing the voice I’d hear would be distraught and getting more and more desperate. I took a deep breath and clicked on ‘Dan’s Mum’, holding the phone up to my ear.

Less than a minute later, the phone was on the floor, tears spilling onto my cheeks as the voice rang around in my head. It was my fault, all my fault. I’d promised him I’d always be there for him but I hadn’t. I left my phone off and left him all by himself. I’d forgotten about him, left the door open and let him roll into the pond.

I slid to the floor, curling up and sobbing loudly as the tear-choked voice of my boyfriend’s mother repeated over and over.

“Phil…I-I-It’s Dan. He-He’s gone Phil, he…he…he killed himself Phil.”


End file.
